Category Archives: Hate crime

Richardson police returned to the mosque and Islamic school Tuesday morning to provide extra security. (Ron Baselice/Staff Photographer)

This post has been updated.

Updated at 4:30 p.m.: The man who was beaten as he left a prayer service at a Richardson mosque on Monday does not believe that he was targeted for his religion or ethnicity, said police spokesman Sgt. Kevin Perlich.

During follow-up interviews with the man, Perlich said the man gave investigators reason to believe there were other motives for the attack.

Investigators are continue to explore potential explanations and have not defined an exclusive motive, but are not ruling out hate crime just yet.

Original item at 7:12 a.m.: A worshipper at a mosque in Richardson was beaten as he left a prayer service Monday night, a day after two Muslim gunmen attacked a controversial art exhibit in Garland.

A witness walking into the prayer meeting at the Islamic Association of North Texas first saw a man loitering in the parking lot in the 840 block of Abrams Road about 9:45 p.m.

A half-hour later, when the service ended, that man and a second attacker “jumps one of the prayer service attendees as he’s walking to the parking lot,” said Sgt. Kevin Perlich, a Richardson police spokesman.

Perlich said the men never said a word to the 59-year-old victim as they knocked him to the ground and began kicking and hitting him. The attack ended when other worshippers came to the man’s aide and the two men ran off, taking nothing.

The victim suffered some scrapes and cuts above his eye, police said. He refused a ride to the hospital and was treated at the scene and released.

Police said Tuesday that they stepped up patrols at the mosque, and other places they believe could be hot spots for hate crimes, soon after Sunday night’s shooting at Garland ISD’s Culwell Center.

It remains unclear whether the assault at the Islamic Association of North Texas was a hate crime inspired by the shooting.

“It was all very quick,” Perlich said. “We don’t know if this an anti-Muslim thing or a robbery attempt or what it was.”

Police have only a “minimal description” of the suspects but hope surveillance camera footage can help, the sergeant said.

Richard Sheridan at Dallas City Hall, where he’s a frequent speaker during council open-mic sessions (G.J. McCarthy)

Nine months after someone tagged a dozen locations — including the Legacy of Love Monument at Cedar Springs and Oak Lawn, the Cathedral of Hope near Dallas Love Field, Dallas City Hall and The Dallas Morning News — with a red “666,” Dallas police say a grand jury has indicted the man they suspected all along: perennial Dallas mayoral candidate Richard Sheridan.

Richard Sheridan in his mug shot taken at 4:02 p.m. today (Dallas County Sheriff)

Assistant Dallas Police Chief Randy Blankenbaker says Sheridan has been indicted, arrested and charged with vandalizing the Legacy of Love Monument and the Cathedral of Hope. The graffiti charge is a state jail felony, says Blankenbaker, but if it’s proved he selected those locations because of their “significance to the LGBT community,” that charge may be upgraded to a third-degree felony.

Says Blankenbaker, Sheridan is not being charged with the 10 other instances of graffiti “at this time.” He says “significant” time was spent on this investigation, and the two cases that led to Sheridan’s indictment and arrest were the best cases.

In August, police told The Dallas Morning News that Sheridan was the only person who’d been questioned in the case. Sheridan maintained he didn’t do it: “I’m not guilty, I’m not guilty, I’m not guilty,” he told our Tristan Hallman on August 14 in the lobby of Dallas police headquarters. But Sheridan said he knew who did — and that he agreed with the tags. He also said that despite what police were saying, the tags were “not a hate crime [but] an act of love — and a warning.”

Monday’s debate might have just lost a participant …

Sheridan, who frequently distributes anti-gay leaflets around Dallas City Hall and has been escorted out of council chambers more than once, took to his Facebook page last summer to admit to having been interviewed twice. He insisted he was merely “representing the person who did it.” In an open letter to Dallas police on August 2, Sheridan claimed that the person who actually tagged the locations “recognizes that there are some in the Gay community, the rabid faction, that wants vengence [sic], wants a ‘scalp’, wants to hang him out to dry, wants to send a message across Dallas and the Nation that (if they get their way) this is what will happen to anyone who dares to call out the immorality of the Gay lifestyle, to reference the Bible in saying that the Gay community is violating Gods laws.”

The Springtown man who pleaded guilty to beating and kidnapping a 24-year-old man he met online last year will spend the next 183 months behind bars.

Brice Johnson was staring at the possibility of spending the rest of his life in prison following the Sept. 2, 2013, assault on Arron Keahey, which left Keahey in a Harris Methodist Hospital bed for 10 days as he recovered from multiple skull and facial fractures and a traumatic brain injury. Federal law enforcement officials had already classified the beating as a hate crime. Said the FBI, Johnson, who met his victim using the MeetMe.com app, sent Keahey to the hospital for one reason: “because of [his] actual or perceived sexual orientation.”

But in a Fort Worth courtroom earlier today, U.S. District Judge Reed C. O’Connor handed down the 15-year sentence, according to the U.S. attorney’s office in Dallas.

“Quite simply, hate crimes of any nature will not be tolerated,” said U.S. Attorney Sarah R. Saldaña of the Northern District of Texas in a statement released today. “Prosecutions under this law are important to ensure all people in our community know they have the full protection of the law. I commend not only the victim for his continued cooperation throughout this investigation, but our law enforcement partners including the FBI, the Springtown Police Department and the Parker County Sheriff’s Office, who worked tirelessly in this case to ensure our hate crime laws are strictly enforced.”

Johnson’s been in custody ever since the Labor Day 2013 attack, which began with the online hook-up that resulted in Keahey driving to the Parker County home where Johnson had been living as a “long-term houseguest,” as the Department of Justice puts it. Johnson admitted to prosecutors that he was only sending Keahey sexually suggestive texts to lure him to the house. When he arrived, Johnson savagely beat him, bound his wrists with electrical cord, then threw him into the trunk of his Ford Fusion, according to June’s plea agreement. He only drove Keahey to the hospital after friends threatened to turn him in if he didn’t.

“Using violence against another person because of his sexual orientation will not be condoned,” said Acting Assistant Attorney General Vanita Gupta for the Civil Rights Division in a statement released Monday. “The department will continue to work with our state, local, and federal law enforcement partners to vigorously prosecute hate crimes.”

It’s been almost a month since the Dallas Police Department’s said anything publicly about its search for the person who tagged 11 locations with a bright red “666″ at the end of June. But Dallas police sources now indicate just one person has been question in connection with the spray-painting: frequent Dallas City Council open-mic performer Richard Sheridan, who, when he ran for the District 13 seat in 2013, garnered 28 votes. Sheridan also acknowledges that he’s a suspect.

Richard Sheridan in Dealey Plaza last November

Sources say Sheridan has been interviewed twice following the June 29 taggings, which left several local landmarks — including the Legacy of Love Monument at Cedar Springs and Oak Lawn, the Cathedral of Hope near Dallas Love Field, Dallas City Hall and The Dallas Morning News — decorated with The Mark of the Beast. A Dallas PD source says he’s been brought in “based on his previous outspokenness regarding the gay community as well as his Facebook page postings.”

On his Facebook page, Sheridan acknowledges being interviewed twice — as someone “representing the person who did it.” He also goes on (and on and on and on) explaining why this person did what they did — something to do with a “BIBLICAL WARNING.” Here’s an excerpt from his August 2 open letter to a Dallas police detective in which he claims to be speaking for the person responsible:

He recognizes the significance of the graffiting “event” to both the Gay community, and to all residents of Dallas. He also recognizes that there are some in the Gay community, the rabid faction, that wants vengence, wants a “scalp”, wants to hang him out to dry, wants to send a message across Dallas and the Nation that (if they get their way) this is what will happen to anyone who dares to call out the immorality of the Gay lifestyle, to reference the Bible in saying that the Gay community is violating Gods laws. As you mentioned, there are even some in the Dallas Police Dept. that might be blinded by a political agenda when, as you related to me, they responded to my recent voice mail offer to you from him with “What’s in it for the Police Dept.?

The day before, Sheridan acknowledged that as “perhaps one of the most outspoken persons concerning the gay agenda I am now a suspect in the ongoing investigation into the 666 graffiting which happened 1 month ago. 13 locations associated with the Gay agenda were spray painted with the 666 number…THE SIGN OF SATAN, THE SIGN OF EVIL.”

It’s not of the highest quality in all the land. But Dallas police say they are in the process of enhancing this footage from Dallas City Hall, and possibly more, and that it will be released in due course. But they wanted something out there sooner than later, because you never know who recognizes what … especially since the tagger left his “666″ in broad daylight.

Police say it’s likely the tagger will be charged with a hate crime given some of the locations, including the Legacy of Love Monument at Cedar Springs and Oak Lawn and the Cathedral of Hope near Dallas Love Field.

The Dallas Police Department now says 11 sites were tagged with “666″ over the weekend, including Dallas City Hall and the former Texas School Book Depository, which houses Dallas County government offices and the Sixth Floor Museum. Police also say they are looking for a single suspect — a “young man,” says a spokesperson, at least based on surveillance video taken from the Dallas City Hall garage and another location on McKinney Avenue and Bowen Street.

The department describes the person with a fondness for red spray paint and The Mark of the Beast as a “white male, approximately 6 feet tall, who was seen spray painting the newsstand at the Shell gas station” at that Uptown intersection. Police say the incident occurred around 7 a.m. Sunday.

“He was wearing khaki cargo shorts, a dark-colored shirt or jacket, black ball cap and a backpack,” says the department. “This same person was seen a half hour later riding a mountain bike in the vicinity of Akard and Young Streets, where he was also seen spray-painting the walls to the entrance of the underground parking garage of Dallas City Hall.”

The Legacy of Love Monument at Cedar Springs Road and Oak Lawn Avenue was the first landmark reported to have been tagged. But by Sunday afternoon and Monday morning others emerged: the Cathedral of Hope Church on Cedar Springs near Inwood Road, the Cedar Springs overpass at the Dallas North Tollway, the Dallas Observer‘s office building on Maple and Oak Lawn, The Dallas Morning News on Young Street, Dallas City Hall, the street outside D at 750 N. St. Paul Street, two Dallas Voice newspaper boxes on McKinney Avenue and, most recently, the Resource Center-Youth First on Harry Hines.

The Dallas Police Department said Monday it’s investigating the tagging as a hate crime because several locations were in Oak Lawn, and because June was LGBT Pride Month.

According to the criminal complaint filed last week in Fort Worth, as well as the WFAA-Channel 8 account from September, early on the morning of September 2 last year Keahey and Johnson connected via the cellphone app for MeetMe.com, which bills itself as “the public market leader for social discovery.”

Keahey’s profile stated quite clearly that he’s gay, says the FBI, while Johnson’s page indicated he was not. Keahey would later say he thought Johnson was either gay or bisexual, according to Channel 8′s account. The FBI says Johnson gave Keahy his cell number and home address, and the two men “exchanged text messages planning their sexual activity.”

But federal authorities allege that Johnson clearly had other plans: Keahey was attacked the moment he arrived at Johnson’s house, says the FBI — beaten, bound and then put in the trunk of his own car, after which, the FBI says, Johnson drove him to a friend’s house, where occupants told Johnson to take Keahey to the hospital or else they’d call police. Johnson complied, and Keahey wound up hospitalized for 10 days at Harris Methodist Hospital in Fort Worth, where doctors tended to his myriad skull and facial fractures.

The criminal complaint unsealed yesterday says Johnson initially told Springtown police Lt. Curtis Stone that he found Keahey beaten in the trunk of his car, and that he’d seen a black truck driving away from the scene. He then changed his story, says the complaint: He admitted to meeting up with Keahey, but says he didn’t think their “sexual communications” were for real. Johnson said he hit Keahey “about five times,” then blacked out himself only to wake up and find Keahey on the ground, bleeding. He told investigators he put Keahey in the trunk because he thought he was dead.

Stone initially referred to the incident as a “possible hate crime.” Federal authorities say there is no doubt it was.

“The investigation revealed that on the night of the incident, Johnson saved [Keahey’s] cell phone number using a gay slur as a contact name, and Johnson later stated that he was playing a prank on the victim because of his sexual orientation, again using a gay slur when referring to [Keahey],” says the FBI’s release. “According to the affidavit, [Keahey] said that he had no physical contact with Johnson prior to the attack.”

Johnson made his initial appearance in court Thursday, and hasn’t been indicted, merely charged with committing a hate crime, for which the statutory maximum penalty is 10 years in federal prison and a $250,000 fine.

McKinney police spokesman Sgt. Chad Barker said investigators will look at the possibility that a hate crime occurred because a religious center was targeted. But, he added, police have yet to identify any suspects, so the motivation is unknown.

“We’re looking at everything really, but at this point it’s just criminal mischief,” he said.

Barker also said the whole area around the mosque — especially the nearby Sonic Drive-In — has become an evening hangout for teens and young adults. The gatherings prompted the owner of the McKinney Islamic Association’s adjoining shopping center on W. Eldorado Parkway to also request additional police patrols in the area.

Original post, 10:43 p.m. June 2: A mosque was pelted with paintballs over the weekend, prompting the North Texas chapter of a national Muslim advocacy group to call for a hate crime investigation.

McKinney Islamic Association officials said two dozen paintballs were fired at a mosque either Saturday night or early Sunday morning, the Council on American-Islamic Relations announced in a news release. The association’s officials also claimed that worshipers have been harassed recently by a group of young people.

“If a bias motive is proven in this case, the perpetrators should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law, including appropriate hate crime enhancements,” said Amina Rab, the council’s North Texas chapter president.

Police have said they will step up patrols in the area, officials said.

Sondra Scarber, with her son Jaxon, still drinks her meals through a straw a month after the attack. (Courtesy photo)

An assault on a mother who was protecting her child last month at a Mesquite playground remains unsolved and is now being called a hate crime by Crime Stoppers.

The North Texas Crime Commission is offering a $5,000 reward for tips leading to the arrest of the man who attacked Sondra Scarber on Feb. 17.

Mesquite police say Scarber and her partner, Hilary Causey, had taken their 4-year-old son, Jaxon, to the Seaborne Elementary School playground around 2:30 p.m. that day. Scarber says she tried to break up a fight between Jaxon and a 10-year-old when the older boy’s sister went to get their father from their car.

When the father arrived, he initially thought Scarber was a man and said, “Men shouldn’t pick on little kids,” according to Lt. Bill Hedgpeth, a police spokesman.

When a woman the father was with informed him that Scarber was a woman, he beat the 27-year-old unconscious, yelling homophobic slurs during the attack, then took her Seattle Mariners baseball cap and drove away.

“Jaxon came up to me and asked if I was dead,” Scarber said. “I told him if I was dead, I wouldn’t be talking to you.”

An elderly Richland Hills woman accused of an anti-gay hate crime in an attack on her son’s would-be roommate last spring has died, the Tarrant County DA’s office says.

Wanda Derby was to appear in court Monday on charges of aggravated assault for her first pretrial hearing in the March 28 attack, according to Christopher McGregor, an assistant district attorney.

Derby, 72, was accused of striking the 25-year-old man several times with her wooden cane before holding him against a wall with the cane across his throat. Witnesses say she also struck the victim’s mother as she called 911.

Police arrived at the Ash Park Apartments to find the man with marks and bruises on his throat and torso. When speaking to officers, police said, Derby referred to the victim using a gay slur and said he had AIDS and was “going to kill” her son.

Police say Derby’s son planned to move in together with the victim, which angered Derby.